1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an error informing apparatus and an error informing method.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, a functional expansion board, which has devices and software, which are necessary for network communications such as a LAN interface, is added to an expansion slot, which is provided in the main body of the existing apparatus such as a facsimile apparatus, a printer, a copy machine, etc., so that a network-capable function is added to the main body of this apparatus.
For example, the following case can be explained when the function of the Internet facsimile apparatus (hereinafter referred to as IFAX”) as disclosed in Unexamined Japanese Patent Publication HEI No. 8-242326 and the corresponding U.S. Pat. No. 5,881,233 is added to the conventional facsimile apparatus (hereinafter referred to as PSTN-FAX) using the telephone line. Specifically, LAN board, which has devices such as an interface for connecting to CPU, LAN, and a memory with such a program that implements each function of format converting means for converting image data to a format of e-mail, format invert converting means for converting e-mail to format of image data (facsimile data) and e-mail receiving/transmitting means for receiving/transiting email-format image data over LAN, is added to the main body of PSTN-FAX. Then, necessary data is exchanged between CPU on the main body of the facsimile apparatus side and CPU on the LAN board side so that IFAX communication processing is implemented.
In this case, connection between a mail server and IFAX cannot be sometimes established because of occurrence of error on the LAN board side, or the LAN side, or the mail server side. At this time, CPU on the main body of IFAX displays a message, which indicates an error, for example, “server connection fault” or a code on a display on the main body of IFAX side so as to inform an operator of occurrence of abnormity.
However, information that the operation can know from the message is too rough to determine the reason why the IFAX cannot connect to the mail server easily. As the reason why the IFAX cannot connect to the mail server, various reasons such as trouble of LAN board, that of LAN, that of mail server, etc., can be considered. Moreover, the measures against the trouble differ depending on at which stage of protocol the trouble has occurred.
To detect the trouble occurred in the LAN board and notify the operator of the result specifically, the upgrading of the program on the LAN board or the installation of an auxiliary program can be considered. To recognize this notification by the main body of IFAX the facsimile apparatus and display on the display device, there must be provided communication means between the main body of the facsimile apparatus and the LAN board. For this reason, the upgrading of the program on the main body of the facsimile apparatus or the installation of an auxiliary program is needed in the same manner as the above. This results in increases in time and cost, which are required for development. Moreover, this upgrading increases an area where the program occupies in the memory on the main body of IFAX side, causing trouble in which an area for receiving an image is reduced.
Additionally, in the present system, the code or the message, which corresponds to the trouble in the LAN board, is divided into parts, so that specific error information can be classified to some degree. In this case, however, complex information, which is unnecessary for the user, is displayed on the display device, and this may confuse the user.